“Why bother, when you’ve so generously done all the hard work for me?” Manella drawls.
Paca starts singing again, her face just barely in view, before the knights completely swallow her. Losing sight of her means we can’t see anything at all going on, and they could be doing anything.
Her song cuts out as she cries out in pain, the sound of it slicing through to something deep inside of me.
Something pulses in the air, as my eyes begin to burn, and my skin sizzles.
Gage’s eyes start glowing brighter and brighter, but it’s only a mild distraction as I strain to break the holds against me.
I feel something inside me snap, as Kai roars like a feral beast. Jude leaps away from the wall, snapping free first, eyes glowing just as bright as Gage’s.
Kai breaks free next, and I’m right behind him, feeling as though I’m tearing away from it as I charge full speed toward the melee.
Gage lands at my side, just as another pulse of power thunders through the air. We all swing our weapons out at once, and something new creeps through my veins with an awakened, burning sensation that rips through my very core.
An ominous strike of lightning slices through the floating chunk of land, as another light flashes so brightly it’s almost blinding.
Rage.
Fury.
Anger.
Madness.
Wrath…
It all unleashes at once, pain slicing through each nerve in my body, as a tortured scream tears through my lips.
Chapter 21
PACA
The shift in the air, along with a crisp popping sound, has me shoving away from the relentless attackers, my heartbeat pounding in my ears, even as the muted pain in my body starts to quickly ebb.
My fire burns away most of the superficial wounds that look worse than they really are. It’s nothing compared to what an archangel or Hell child can do to one’s innards. The screaming was just to egg them on and provoke their instincts during the throes of battle, taking a chance that they can’t be true to their hearts unless they shut down their brains the way I have so many times.
My head pokes through a set of legs, and my eyes widen, as a breath hisses through my lips.
A light flashes as their furious screams echo through the air, and I watch as their veins bulge, turning dark, like something new is pumping through them. It half terrifies me, because I don’t know what’s going on.
The ground starts to vibrate, lightning begins to crash, and it sounds like a stampede is rolling through when thunder spontaneously boulders across the sky.
That blinding light suddenly explodes from the four of them in a slicing motion, screams of effort and agony ripping through their throats with unyielding ferocity, and I watch in awe as all the bodies around me turn to immediate ash, dropping in piles.
The soul stones split in half, the top half turning to ash, just like anything else above that line of power. That alone is enough to help register the magnitude of that strike.
It worked…
That has to be it.
The Unity Strike.
Monsters all throughout the maze crash with it, as the maze is blown to half the size it was.
Even the floating piece of the land where I was sitting turns to ash and rains down on me, as I slowly sit up, unaffected, watching as the power rolls through the rest of purgatory, the ring of light expanding outward and destroying anything in its path.
For as far as I can see, anything above that line no longer exists. That’ll do, Pig. That’ll do.
If I weaken Jahl, and they hit him a few times with that, we may can get around those damn trigger issues after all.
Ashes rain down on the land, as an eerie silence quickly descends. The thunder, lightning, and heckling siblings are all gone. My gaze scans over the ruins, slowly taking in the damage, and just as slowly moving back to my guys.
Ezekiel is on his knees, staring at me, even as he breathes heavily, eyes still brighter than I’ve ever seen them.
Their Spartan outfits are on, but they look like they’ve been upgraded with gold touches here and there on the black, shining armor pieces.
Jude lowers his more ornate scythe that glistens, even as a hazy fog surrounds the blade. His blue eyes go black in the next instant as they cut to me, and I swallow thickly as the sky thunders and a bit of lightning streaks.
It lights up their faces as rain starts to fall, and with every fresh bit of light, I see a super creepy, but oddly hot, x-ray type of thing going on, giving them a skeletal shadow beneath their skin.
Kai pushes up from the ground, glowing blue eyes on me that only seem to intensify, as he slowly straightens until he’s standing at his full height. His triton is solid gold, glistening with hieroglyphics that seem to form before my very eyes along the shaft.
All their weapons start getting inscribed, as a matter of fact. Gage’s sword is the last to receive marks, as the shining silver and gold metals overlap to forge a sword Excalibur would envy.
I remain on the ground, staying on my knees, just breathing and taking it all in, struggling to believe that really worked. The old Paca was incredibly brilliant. I hate her for overestimating my intelligence and expecting these vague, crappy clues to guide me.
The four of them circle me until I’m surrounded, and I wait for the nuclear meltdown that will punish me for my rash course of action…
Jude eyes his scythe.
Kai inspects his triton.
Gage checks the weight on his new sword.
Ezekiel twirls his gold staff with a black blade at the tip. It looks fit for a king now.
Then, as one, they all turn their attention to me again.
“Please don’t punish me unless I’ll like it,” I decide to say, swallowing the lump in my throat, since they look slightly murderous.
“Told you she’d figure out it was us,” Kai states as though he’s accusing someone of something.
“Which means we wore those stupid fucking costumes for no reason,” Ezekiel states in a sour tone, while I still reel from the absurd amount of power a Unity Strike clearly holds.
We really may finally have a chance with a weapon like that at our disposal.
Jude gestures down at himself in his Spartan uniform, casting an incredulous look at Ezekiel. “Because these costumes don’t look stupid at all,” he says dryly.
Ezekiel pauses, as though he’s just remembered he’s now wearing the Spartan outfit as well. Their capes are purple and long, whipping in the light breeze, as the ashes continue to drift down like snow.
“Besides,” Jude goes on, shooting a look at me, “it’s not like I knew she’d do a song-and-dance routine and almost get us killed with the distraction. I expected her to step in and ruin the entire point we were attempting to make if she found out it was us.”
“I wanted to, but I had to do what felt true to my heart,” I state very seriously, patting my chest.
I get a blank stare from all four of them.
“I can’t believe you thought you’d simply replace us as Horsemen,” Gage bites out, glaring at me as he twirls his sword…just before it disappears.
Apparently he meant for it to disappear, because he doesn’t look concerned about it.
“I don’t want you dying, and desperate times call for desperate measures,” I explain, still on my knees as the four of them crowd my space a little more.
“Did you really think we would just let you give away our powers and fuck four other men in our place?” Kai asks me, eyes narrowing.
“I don’t think we’re quite that replaceable,” Ezekiel chimes in.
They sound nothing like themselves.
“You’re not all that replaceable, it seems,” I murmur, looking back around at the collateral damage. “Wait. What?” I ask, snapping my head back to see four angry glares still on me.
“Who said anything about fucking them? I was just going to give them your power, let them die, and then return your powers to you at the end of the battle, whether I live or die,” I assure them.
I’m yanked off the ground in the next instant, and Kai pulls me to him, releasing a shuddering breath against my forehead as he…hugs me.
Kai is hugging me.
I hug him back, since it’s really sweet, and I probably won’t ever get hugged like this again.
“You had to fuck them if you wanted to give them the powers, Paca. Don’t be so naïve,” Jude states in an angry tone…
That bitch. That’s why she was so excited. And awwww! My guys were jealous! Yay!
“Could you not toss out the possibility of you dying so casually and dismissively?” Kai asks quietly, arms fastening around me tighter.
My heart thumps a little harder, and I snuggle my head on his chest.
“Okay,” I tell him.
“And you owe us an apology for trying to replace us,” Jude says in his typical annoyed tone.
“And also for singing and dancing during that really intense, dangerous battle,” Gage adds as though he genuinely expects such remorse.
“I had to be true to my—”
“Stop saying that,” they all interrupt at the exact same moment.
I smile to myself, noting their bond is stronger. I can feel the power radiating from them.
“I can’t tell if you’re a sadist or a masochist at this point. The next time you decide to torture yourself right in front of us, we’ll—”
A round of applause has Ezekiel swallowing the rest of that threat, and I peer around Kai’s arm to spot Manella and Lamar clapping for us. Manella is smirking. Lamar is brazenly beaming at us as he dabs at the tears in the corners of his eyes.
“Congratulations. You’ve found your Unity Strike much easier than when you were seasoned pros,” Manella drawls. “Wasn’t hard to assume Paca would have assured it’d be easier to use in this life.”
“Did they kill Hera?” I ask, my heart swelling with—
“No,” comes Hera’s dry voice as she appears, sneering as she studies her nails and sulks.
“Damn,” I say on a deflated exhale.
She cuts a look toward me, even as Kai pats my back like he’s genuinely sorry for not exterminating the tricky sister.
I bet she wanted to steal them once she convinced them I was unfaithful.
I’ll cut a bitch down later. I’m getting in snuggle time with my Horsemen right now.
I may want to keep them sheltered and safe, but the old me knew she couldn’t do it without them. Obviously I can’t either. I have to believe that she has all those paranoid contingency plans in effect that will keep them safe.
Just like what happened seconds ago, I’ll know what to do when it matters most.
My boys won’t fall.
Chapter 22
PACA
“I don’t understand why a short, mustache-wearing plumber gets his own game, when we’re clearly better options,” Kai says as he bites down on his tongue in concentration, wiggling the controls like that’s going to help him out of the mess he’s gotten himself in.
I’m on the couch behind him, my legs spread so he can sit on the floor between them. It’s a comfortable position that allows me to touch him a lot.